914Works in the College of Visual and Performing Arts will host a closing reception for “Asylum,” an exhibition of paintings by artist Deale Hutton, on Thursday, Sept. 8, from 6-8 p.m. The reception is free and open to the public. 914Works is located at 914 E. Genesee St., Syracuse.
“Sitting in the Fires of Hell” by Deale Hutton
Hutton’s “Asylum” series explores the ideation roaming our minds. It is an attempt to find commonality, an understanding, a questioning of views on sanity. The paintings are oils, tissue paper and gels using psychic automatism, a surrealist technique. Images found in these paintings are randomly pulled from the rubble of the artist’s mind, from the splotches, the washes of paint.
A painter and sculptor, Hutton’s work focuses on transformation. The work is expressionistic in style, surrealist in content and includes representational and abstract elements. She paints predominantly in oils and sculpts in wax, copper and stone. She also uses such unusual media as gels, netting and tissue paper to add texture and dimension.
Originally from Minneapolis, Hutton lived in Denver for many years and went to Regis University, where she received a bachelor of arts degree in political science and sociology. She received a master’s degree in library science from Syracuse University in 1990 and taught as a middle school librarian for eight years.
When Hutton became interested in weaving and spinning, she took evening drawing and painting courses at the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, N.Y., and fell in love with art. She left teaching and went to SUNY Oswego, receiving a bachelor of fine arts degree in 2001, and then received a master of fine arts degree from Rochester Institute of Technology in 2003. She held the position of art librarian and curator for Penfield Library at SUNY Oswego until 2010, when she retired. She is now a full-time artist.
For more information about the exhibition, email 914works@syr.edu.
